Audio 4:09
Japanese villages call for international support to oppose seawall

Alison CaldwellUpdated
Fri 1 Nov 2013, 2:45 PM AEDT

A group of Japanese villagers are calling for international support to help them oppose government plans for a giant seawall to protect it against future tsunamis. An Australian landscape architect is working in conjunction with Japanese designers to help several villages come up with alternatives to the seawall. They recently held a community symposium in Kesenumma to discuss the alternatives.

Transcript

SCOTT BEVAN: A group of Japanese villagers are calling for international support for their opposition to government plans for a giant seawall designed to protect communities from future tsunamis.

Earlier this month we brought you a story about one of those villages, Shibitachi, and how an Australian landscape architect is working with Japanese designers to come up with alternatives to the seawall.

The architects and designers recently held a symposium in the Japanese city of Kesennuma to discuss the alternatives.

Alison Caldwell reports.

ALISON CALDWELL: Dr Marieluise Jonas is a landscape architect at Melbourne's RMIT University. She also works with Tokyo University's Ota Lab.

She's just returned from Kesennuma, 250 kilometres north of Fukushima, on Japan's north-east coast, where she met with community leaders from fishing villages - villages like Shibitachi.

Dr Jonas says many fishermen don't want the government's proposed concrete seawall to be built along their sea front. In the case of Shibitachi it would be ten metres tall and 200 metres long.

MARIELUISE JONAS: The response was really fantastic. The community were incredibly engaged. We made an effort to actually invite people in who have got a broad range of design practice in landscape architecture to show alternatives to currently proposed solutions such as the seawall. He had new and innovative technology for instance with an escape route map that functions as an iPhone app for instance.

ALISON CALDWELL: What about in terms of the size of the seawall? Was something shown to them that gave them a better idea of how the seawall will look?

MARIELUISE JONAS: The colleagues from Tokyo University, Professor Ota had produced a model, a physical model and the villagers were quite surprised to see the huge scale of the proposed seawall, so this model made it really quite tangible.

ALISON CALDWELL: The seawall is the only recovery option put forward by the Japanese government for Shibitachi.

Opponents say it fails to consider the impact on the economy and the local culture and doesn't present a sustainable design outcome for the village.

MARIELUISE JONAS: The hope that we have for the community is to raise the awareness on an international level will help them to actually be noticed and not be overrun by a one fits all solution.

ALISON CALDWELL: Hiroko Otsuka is from Kesenumma. Her mother, niece and nephew were all killed by the tsunami in 2011.

HIROKO OTSUKA: There are about 390,000 people who are still displaced. Most of the people in that area are still living in those temporarily with their actual units, and it's only just recently that we have realised the extent of this plan.

ALISON CALDWELL: Hiroko Otsuka teaches Japanese in Tasmania. She says Kesennuma is much like Hobart and she wants people to imagine how Hobart would be affected by a giant seawall standing between the city and the harbour.

HIROKO OTSUKA: If we really look at how the victims of this tsunami, nearly 20,000 people, it is because of those feeling that you're probably safe. You know, there are victims that didn't run.

ALISON CALDWELL: The wall made them feel as if they didn't have to run?

HIROKO OTSUKA: That's one of the biggest reasons.

ALISON CALDWELL: Hiroko Otsuka believes the villagers can stop the seawalls but they need international support to achieve it.

HIROKO OTSUKA: It is very, very difficult. We have been campaigning against it for two years. The Japanese government or the political system has this top down mentality that even the local officials cannot think for their own children's future. If they were told to do this way, they have to do it this way.

ALISON CALDWELL: I have heard people describe it, the media in Japan describe it as, it is almost like blackmail. You accept this seawall and then we will help you with other things. If you don't accept the seawall, nothing will happen for you.

HIROKO OTSUKA: Yes it is. Please help us.

SCOTT BEVAN: That's Hiroko Otsuka who lost her mother, niece and nephew in the 2011 tsunami. She was speaking to our reporter Alison Caldwell.